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The PreSocraticsAn Overview

ContentsArticlesIntroduction 1

Pre-Socratic philosophy 1Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks 4Classical element 9Ionian School (philosophy) 15Paired opposites 18Material monism 21Diogenes Lartius 21Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers 23

The Milesians 27Milesian school 27Thales 29Anaximander 40Anaximenes of Miletus 51

Pythagoreanism 53Pythagoreanism 53Pythagoras 59Philolaus 70Alcmaeon of Croton 72Archytas 75

Ephesian School 78Heraclitus 78

Eleatic School 89Eleatics 89Xenophanes 90Parmenides 93Zeno of Elea 100Zeno's paradoxes 102Melissus 109

Pluralists 110Pluralist school 110Empedocles 111Anaxagoras 118

Atomists 122Atomism 122Leucippus 132Democritus 134

The Sophists 144Sophism 144Protagoras 148Gorgias 150Hippias 155Prodicus 156

The Seven Sages 160Seven Sages of Greece 160Solon 162Chilon of Sparta 176Bias of Priene 178Cleobulus 180Pittacus of Mytilene 181Periander 182

Others 184Diogenes of Apollonia 184Aristeas 185Pherecydes of Syros 187Anacharsis 191

ReferencesArticle Sources and Contributors 194Image Sources, Licenses and Contributors 199

Article LicensesLicense 201

1Introduction

Pre-Socratic philosophyPre-Socratic philosophy is Greek philosophy before Socrates. In Classical antiquity, the Presocratic philosopherswere called physiologoi (in English, physical or natural philosophers).[1] Diogenes Lartius divides the physiologoiinto two groups, Ionian and Italiote, led by Anaximander and Pythagoras, respectively.[2]

Hermann Diels popularized the term pre-socratic in Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker (The Fragments of thePre-Socratics) in 1903. However, the term pre-Sokratic was in use as early as George Grote's Plato and the OtherCompanions of Sokrates in 1865. Major analyses of pre-Socratic thought have been made by Gregory Vlastos,Jonathan Barnes, and Friedrich Nietzsche in his Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks.It may sometimes be difficult to determine the actual line of argument some Presocratics used in supporting theirparticular views. While most of them produced significant texts, none of the texts has survived in complete form. Allthat is available are quotations by later philosophers (often biased) and historians, and the occasional textualfragment.The Presocratic philosophers rejected traditional mythological explanations of the phenomena they saw around themin favor of more rational explanations. These philosophers asked questions about "the essence of things":[3]

From where does everything come? From what is everything created? How do we explain the plurality of things found in nature? How might we describe nature mathematically?Others concentrated on defining problems and paradoxes that became the basis for later mathematical, scientific andphilosophic study.Later philosophers rejected many of the answers the early Greek philosophers provided, but continued to placeimportance on their questions. Furthermore, the cosmologies proposed by them have been updated by laterdevelopments in science.

History

Graphical relationship among the various pre-socratic philosophers and thinkers; redarrows indicate a relationship of opposition.

Western philosophy began in ancientGreece in the 6th century BCE. ThePresocratics were mostly from theeastern or western fringes of the Greekworld. Their efforts were directed tothe investigation of the ultimate basisand essential nature of the externalworld.[4] They sought the materialprinciple (arch) of things, and themethod of their origin anddisappearance.[4] As the firstphilosophers, they emphasized the

Pre-Socratic philosophy 2

rational unity of things, and rejected mythological explanations of the world. Only fragments of the original writingsof the presocratics survive. The knowledge we have of them derives from accounts of later philosophical writers(especially Aristotle, Plutarch, Diogenes Lartius, Stobaeus and Simplicius), and some early theologians, (especiallyClement of Alexandria and Hippolytus).

Milesian schoolThe first Presocratic philosophers were from Miletus on the western coast of Anatolia. Thales (624-546 BCE) isreputed the father of Greek philosophy; he declared water to be the basis of all things.[4] Next came Anaximander(610-546 BCE), the first writer on philosophy. He assumed as the first principle an undefined, unlimited substancewithout qualities, out of which the primary opposites, hot and cold, moist and dry, became differentiated.[4] Hisyounger contemporary, Anaximenes (585-525 BCE), took for his principle air, conceiving it as modified, bythickening and thinning, into fire, wind, clouds, water, and earth.[4]

PythagoreanismThe practical side of philosophy was introduced by Pythagoras of Samos (582-496 BCE). Regarding the world asperfect harmony, dependent on number, he aimed at inducing humankind likewise to lead a harmonious life. Hisdoctrine was adopted and extended by a large following of Pythagoreans who gathered at his school in south Italy inthe town of Croton.[4] His followers included Philolaus (470-380 BCE), Alcmaeon of Croton, and Archytas (428-347BCE).

Ephesian schoolHeraclitus of Ephesus on the western coast of Anatolia in modern Turkey (535-475 BCE) posited that all things innature are in a state of perpetual flux held together by a dynamic, eternal structure or pattern, which he termed theLogos. Metaphorically, Heraclitus had used the image of fire to represent this eternal pattern. From fire all thingsoriginate, and return to it again by a never-ending process of development.

Eleatic SchoolThe Eleatic School, called after the town of Elea (modern name Velia in south Italy), emphasized the doctrine of theOne. Xenophanes of Colophon (570-470 BCE), declared God to be the eternal unity, permeating the universe, andgoverning it by his thought.[4] Parmenides of Elea (510-440 BCE), affirmed the one unchanging existence to bealone true and capable of being conceived, and multitude and change to be an appearance without reality.[4] Thisdoctrine was defended by his younger countryman Zeno of Elea (490-430 BCE) in a polemic against the commonopinion which sees in things multitude, becoming, and change. Zeno propounded a number of celebrated paradoxes,much debated by later philosophers, which try to show that supposing that there is any change or multiplicity leadsto contradictions.[4] Melissus of Samos (born c. 470 BCE) was another eminent member of this school.

Pluralist SchoolEmpedocles of Agrigentum (490-430 BCE) was from the ancient Greek city of Akragas (), Agrigentum inLatin, modern Agrigento, in Sicily. He appears to have been partly in agreement with the Eleatic School, partly inopposition to it. On the one hand, he maintained the unchangeable nature of substance; on the other, he supposes aplurality of such substances - ie. four classical elements, earth, water, air, and fire. Of these the world is built up, bythe agency of two ideal motive forces - love as the cause of union, strife as the cause of separation.[4] Anaxagoras ofClazomenae (500-428 BCE) in Asia Minor, also maintained the existence of an ordering principle as well as amaterial substance, and while regarding the latter as an infinite multitude of imperishable primary elements; heconceived divine reason or Mind (nous) as ordering them. He referred all generation and disappearance to mixtureand resolution respectively. To him belongs the credit of first establishing philosophy at Athens.[4]

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Atomist SchoolThe first explicitly materialistic system was formed by Leucippus (5th century BCE) and his pupil Democritus ofAbdera (460-370 BCE) from Thrace. This was the doctrine of atoms - small primary bodies infinite in number,indivisible and imperishable, qualitatively similar, but distinguished by their shapes. Moving eternally through theinfinite void, they collide and unite, thus generating objects which differ in accordance with the varieties, in number,size, shape, and arrangement, of the atoms which compose them.[4]

OthersThe last of the Presocratic natural philosophers was Diogenes of Apollonia from Thrace (born c. 460 BCE). He wasan eclectic philosopher who adopted many principles of the Milesian school, especially the single material principle,which he identified as air. He explained natural processes in reference to the rarefactions and condensations of thisprimary substance. He also adopted Anaxagoras' cosmic thought.

SophismThe Sophists held that all thought rests solely on the apprehensions of the senses and on subjective impression, andthat therefore we have no other standards of action than convention for the individual.[4] Specializing in rhetoric, theSophists were more professional educators than philosophers. They flourished as a result of a special need at thattime for Greek education. Prominent Sophists include Protagoras (490-420 BCE) from Abdera in Thrace, Gorgias(487-376 BCE) from Leontini in Sicily, Hippias (485-415 BCE) from Elis in the Peloponnesos, and Prodicus(465-390 BCE)from the island of Ceos.

Other early Greek thinkersThis list includes several men, particularly the Seven Sages, who appear to have been practical politicians andsources of epigrammatic wisdom, rather than speculative thinkers or philosophers in the modern sense. Seven Sages of Greece

Solon (c. 594 BCE)Chilon of Sparta (c. 560 BCE)Thales (c. 585 BCE)Bias of Priene (c. 570 BCE)Cleobulus of Rhodes (c. 600 BCE)Pittacus of Mitylene (c. 600 BCE)Periander (625-585 BCE)

Aristeas of Proconnesus (7th century BCE ?) Pherecydes of Syros (c. 540 BCE) Anacharsis (c. 590 BCE)

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References Burnet, John, Early Greek Philosophy, Meridian Books, New York, 1957 Colli, Giorgio, The Greek Wisdom (La Sapienza greca, 3 vol. Milan 1977-1980) G. E. R. Lloyd. Early Greek Science: Thales to Aristotle. New York: Norton, 1970. Kirk, G.S., Raven, J.E. & Schofield, M., The Presocratic Philosophers (Second Edition), Cambridge University

Press, 1983 Nahm, Milton C., Selections from Early Greek Philosophy, Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc., 1962 De Vogel, C.J., Greek Philosophy, Volume I, Thales to Plato, E.J. Brill, Leiden, 1963 Diels, Hermann, Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, 6th ed., rev. by Walther Kranz (Berlin, 1952).

External links Presocratic Philosophy [5] entry by Patricia Curd in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Notes[1] William Keith Chambers Guthrie, The Presocratic Tradition from Parmenides to Democritus, p. 13, ISBN 0317665774.[2] Franco Orsucci, Changing Mind: Transitions in Natural and Artificial Environments, p. 14, ISBN 9812380272.[3] Eduard Feller, Outlines of the History of Greek Philosophy (1955). p. 323.[4] Oskar Seyffert, (1894), Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, page 480[5] http:/ / plato. stanford. edu/ entries/ presocratics

Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the GreeksPhilosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks (Philosophie im tragischen Zeitalter der Griechen) is a publication ofan incomplete book by Friedrich Nietzsche. He had a clean copy made from his notes with the intention ofpublication. The notes were written around 1873. In it he discussed five Greek philosophers from the sixth and fifthcenturies B.C.. They are Thales, Anaximander, Heraclitus, Parmenides, and Anaxagoras. He had, at one time,intended to include Democritus, Empedocles, and Socrates. The book ends abruptly after the discussion ofAnaxagoras's cosmogony.

Early prefaceNietzsche stated that he wanted to present the outlooks of very worthy individuals who originated in ancient Greecefrom 600 B.C. to 400 B.C.. "The task is to bring to light what we must ever love and honor...." Nietzsche wantedfuture humans to be able to say, "So this has existed once, at least and is therefore a possibility, this way of life,this way of looking at the human scene."

Later prefaceBy selecting only a few doctrines for each philosopher, Nietzsche hoped to exhibit each philosopher's personality.

A justification of philosophyNietzsche felt that it is important to know about these philosophers because they were dedicated to finding the truthabout life and the world. Their concern was with the elaboration of their unique personal point of view. Thepre-Socratics existed at a time when Greece was at its height. In such a time of wealthy and successful life, they hadthe strength and independence to question the general worth of existence. The tragedians of that age addressed thesame issue with their plays.

Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks 5

With Plato, philosophers then lost their own individual stylistic unities. Their works and personalities werecombinations of previous types. They became sectarian and didn't contribute to a unified culture. They did not livetheir lives in accordance with their personal outlooks. Plato and subsequent philosophers lacked a pure, unified style.

ThalesThis philosopher proposed that water is the origin af all things. Nietzsche claimed that this must be taken seriouslyfor three reasons.1. It makes a statement about the primal origin of all things;2. It uses language that has nothing to do with fable or myth;3. It reflects the vision that all things are really one.Thales' generalization was the result of creative imagination and analogy. He did not use reason, logical proof, myth,or allegory. This was a first attempt to think about nature without the use of myths about gods. However, instead oftrying to gain knowledge of everything, he wanted to know the one important common property of all things.In order to communicate his vision of oneness, he expressed himself by applying the analogy of water.

AnaximanderAnaximander of Miletus was the first philosopher who wrote his words. His most famous passage is, "The source ofcoming-to-be for existing things is that into which destruction, too, happens according to necessity; for they paypenalty and retribution to each other for their injustice according to the assessment of Time." This pessimisticexpression presented existence as something that should not be. Any definite thing must pay for its individuality by,after a short time, passing back into its indefinite (apeiron) source. This source cannot also be definite. Therefore it isindefinite and does not pass away.Anaximander was the first Greek to provide an ethical or moral interpretation of existence. By emerging from theprimeval oneness, each definite individual thing must pay a price by returning. This meant that the individual,separate existence of each and every thing is unjust. It has no justification or value in itself.His manner of living was in accordance with his thought. He dressed and spoke in a dignified, solemn manner. Thisunity of style was typical of the pre-Platonic philosophers

HeraclitusAs the opposite of Anaximander, Heraclitus saw no injustice, guilt, evil, or penance in the emergence anddisappearance of worldly objects. To him, continuous becoming and passing away is the order of nature. There is awonderful fixed order, regularity, and certainty that shows itself in all change and becoming. Heraclitus did not thinkthat there is a metaphysical, undefinable indefinite (apeiron) out of which all definite things come into existence.Also, he denied that there is any permanent being. Nietzsche paraphrased him as saying, "You use names for thingsas though they rigidly, persistently endured; yet even the stream into which you step a second time is not the one youstepped into before."Heraclitus's way of thinking was the result of perception and intuition. He despised rational, logical, conceptualthought. His pronouncements were purposely self-contradictory. "We are and at the same time are not." "Being andnonbeing is at the same time the same and not the same." This intuitive thinking is based on seeing the changingworld of experience which is conditioned by never-ending variations in time and space. Every object that isperceived through time and space has an existence that is relative to other objects. Nature and reality are seen as acontinuous action in which there is no permanent existence.The unending strife between opposites, which seek to re-unite, is a kind of lawful justice for Heraclitus. Inaccordance with the Greek culture of contest, the strife among all things follows a built-in law or standard.

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According to Heraclitus, the one is the many. Every thing is really fire. In passing away, the things of the worldshow a desire to be consumed in the all-destroying cosmic fire. When they are part of the fire again, their desire isbriefly satisfied. But things soon come into being again as a result of the fire's impulse to play a game with itself.Due to the contradictions that occur in Heraclitus's brief sayings, he has been accused of being obscure. However,Nietzsche asserts that he was very clear. The shortness and terseness of Heraclitus's statements may seem to result intheir obscurity, but Nietzsche stated that they are unclear only for readers who do not take the time to think aboutwhat is being said.Nietzsche interpreted Heraclitus's words, "I sought for myself," as indicating that he possessed great self-esteem andconviction. Without concern as to whether his thoughts appealed to anyone beside himself, he pronounced that hesaw fixed law in the continual change of becoming. Also, he intuited that the particular changes that occur with strictnecessity are, on the whole, the play of a game. Heraclitus wanted future humanity to know his timeless truths.

ParmenidesMany of Parmenides's qualities were the direct opposite of Heraclitus. Heraclitus grasped his truths through intuition.He saw and knew the world of Becoming. Parmenides, however, arrived at his truths through pure logic. Hecalculated and deduced his doctrine of Being.Parmenides had an early doctrine and a later, different, teaching. Nietzsche claimed that Parmenides's two ways ofthinking not only divided his own life into two periods but also separated all pre-Socratic thinking into two halves.The earlier way was the Anaximandrean period. This dealt with two worlds: the world of Becoming and the world ofBeing. The second was the Parmenidean. In this world, there is no becoming, change, or impermanence. There isonly Being.The qualities of the world, Parmenides thought, were divided into opposites. There are positive qualities and thereare their opposite negations. His division was based on abstract logic and not on the evidence of the senses. Thisdichotomy of positive and negative then became the separation into the existent and the nonexistent. For things tobecome, there must be an existent and a non-existent. Desire unites these opposites and creates the world ofBecoming. When desire is satisfied, the existent and the nonexistent oppose each other and the things pass away.Nietzsche did not think that an external event led to Parmenides's denial of Becoming. The influence of Xenophanesis made negligible by Nietzsche. Even though both men gave great importance to the concept of unity, Xenophanescommunicated in ways that were alien to Parmenides. Xenophanes was a philosophical poet whose view of mysticunity was related to religion. He was an ethicist who rejected the contemporary values of Greece. Nietzsche claimedthat the common attribute between Parmenides and Xenophanes was their love of personal freedom andunconventionality, not their emphasis on oneness.The internal event that led to Parmenides's denial of Becoming began when he considered the nature of negativequalities. He asked himself whether something that has no being can have being. Logically, this was the same asasking whether A is not A. Parmenides then realized that what is, is. Also, what is not, is not. His previous thinkingabout negative qualities was then seen as being very illogical. Heraclitus's contradictory statements were consideredto be totally irrational.If that which is, is, and that which is not, is not, then several conclusions follow. That which truly is must be foreverpresent. The existent also is not divisible, because there is no other existent to divide it. It is also immobile and finite.In sum, there is only eternal oneness.The senses lead us to believe otherwise. Therefore, for Parmenides, the senses are illusive, mendacious, anddeceitful. He accepted only his logical and rational conclusions. All sensual evidence was ignored. Parmenides onlyaffirmed his extremely abstract, general truth which was totally unlike the reality of common experience.Although logically certain, Parmenides's concept of being was empty of content. No sense perception illustrated thistruth. "What is, is" is a judgement of pure thought, not experience. Nietzsche claimed that Parmenides created his

Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks 7

concept of being from his own personal experience of feeling himself as alive. He then illogically attributed thisgeneral concept of absolute being to everything in the world. Thus, Nietzsche saw being as a subjective concept thatwas mistakenly asserted to be objective. Nietzsche's paraphrase of Parmenides's truth was, "I breathe, therefore beingexists."Along with his disciple Zeno of Elea, Parmenides stated that there is no such thing as infinity. If infinity exists, itwould be the indivisible, immobile, eternal unity of being. In other words, it would be finite. Zeno's examples offlying arrows and Achilles chasing a tortoise show that motion over an infinite space would be impossible. But wedo experience motion. The world does exhibit finite infinity. Parmenides rejects, then, the perceivable world ofmotion and asserts that reality agrees only with his logical concepts, which do not include finite infinity. For him,thinking and being are the same. What he thinks is what exists.Objections can be raised against Parmenides's principles that sensual perception does not show true reality and thatthinking is unmoving being. If the senses are unreal, how can they deceive? If thinking is immobile being, how doesit move from concept to concept? Instead, it can be stated that the many things that are experienced by the senses arenot deceptive. Also, motion can have being. No objection, however, can be made to Parmenides's self-evident mainteaching that there is being, or, what is, is.

AnaxagorasAnaxagoras raised two objections against Parmenides:1. the origin of semblance, and2. the mobility of thought.He did not object, however, to Parmenides's main doctrine that there is only being, not becoming. Anaximander andHeraclitus had claimed that there is becoming and passing away. Thales and Heraclitus had said that the world ofmultiple qualities comes out of one prime substance. With Anaxagoras, all subsequent philosophers and scientistsrejected all coming into existence out of nothing and disappearance into nothing.If the many things that we experience in the world are not mere semblance but do not come from nothing and do notcome from one single thing, what is their origin? Since like produces like, the many different things come frommany different things. In other words, there are infinitely many different prime substances. Their total is alwaysconstant but their arrangements change.Why do the forms and patterns of these real substances change? Because they are in motion. Change and motion arenot semblance and are truly real. Does the movement come from within each thing? Is there another external thingthat moves each object?Movement is not mere appearance. Movement occurs because each substance is similar to each other substance inthat they are all made of the same matter. There is no total isolation or complete difference between substances. Thiscommon material substratum allows them to interact. When two substances try to occupy the same space, one of thesubstances must move away. This is actual motion and change.If it is certain that our ideas appear to us in succession, then they must move themselves because they are not movedby things that are not ideas. This proves that there is something in the world that moves itself. Ideas are also capableof moving things that are different from themselves. They move the body. Therefore, there is a thinking substancethat moves itself and other substances. This nous (mind, intelligence) is made out of extremely fine and delicatematter. It is an ordering, knowing, purposeful mover. Nous was the first cause of every subsequent mechanicalchange in the universe.Originally, before nous moved the first particle of matter, there was a complete mixture which was composed of infinitely small components of things. Each of these was a homoeomery, the small parts being the same as the large whole. For example, a tooth is made of small teeth. This is the result of the thought that like must come from like. After the movement began, individual objects became separated from this mixture when like combined with like.

Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks 8

When one substance finally predominated, the accumulation became a particular thing. This process is called"coming to be" or "becoming."Nous is not a part of the original mixture. It started the revolutionary motion which separated things from the primalmixture. The motion is a centrifugal, spiralling vortex in which likes attach to their likes. There is no god who movesthings with a purpose in mind. There is only a mechanical whirlpool of movement. Unlike Parmenides's motionlesssphere of being, Anaxagoras saw the world as a moving circle of becoming. Nous started the spinning. Thereafter theuniverse developed on its own, according to lawful necessity.To be able to start and sustain motion against the resistance of the infinite mixture, nous had to use a sudden,infinitely strong and infinitely rapid, force. It also had to move the first point in a circular path that was larger thanits own size. In this way, it affected other points. Nous freely chose to start the vortex. It thereby created its own goaland purpose in a playful game. This was not a moral or ethical process. Rather, it was aesthetic, in that nous simplywanted to enjoy the spectacle of its own creation.Later philosophers, such as Plato, wanted to attribute ethical properties to nous's creation of the world. For them, itshould be made in the most perfect, beautiful, useful manner. Anaxagoras, however, did not employ teleology. Nous,for him, was a mechanical, efficient cause, not a final cause. Any future purpose would have eliminated a freelychosen start.Nietzsche's book abruptly ends here with a description of a nous that created the world as a game. The freedom ofnous's creative will is opposed to the necessary determinism of its creation, the universe. Nous is referred to as amind (Geist) that has free, arbitrary choice. The created world, physis, is a determined, mechanical piece ofmachinery. Any order or efficiency of things is only an outcome of purposeless change.

References Nietzsche, Friedrich, Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks, Regnery Gateway ISBN 0-89526-944-9

Classical element 9

Classical elementMany philosophies and worldviews have a set of classical elements believed to reflect the simplest essential partsand principles of which anything consists or upon which the constitution and fundamental powers of anything arebased. Most frequently, classical elements refer to ancient beliefs inspired by natural observation of the phases ofmatter. Historians trace the evolution of modern theory pertaining to the chemical elements, as well as chemicalcompounds and mixtures of natural substances to medieval, Islamic and Greek models. Many concepts once thoughtto be analogous, such as the Chinese Wu Xing, are now understood more figuratively.

Ancient classic element systemsIn classical thought, the four elements Earth, Water, Air, and Fire frequently occur; sometimes including a fifthelement or quintessence (after "quint" meaning "fifth") called Aether in ancient Greece.In Greek thought, the philosopher Aristotle added aether as the quintessence, reasoning that whereas fire, earth, air,and water were earthly and corruptible, since no changes had been perceived in the heavenly regions, the stars cannotbe made out of any of the four elements but must be made of a different, unchangeable, heavenly substance.[1]

The concept of essentially the same five elements was similarly found in ancient India, where they formed a basis ofanalysis in both Hinduism and Buddhism. In Hinduism, particularly in an esoteric context, the four states-of-matterdescribe matter, and a fifth element describes that which was beyond the material world (non-matter). Similar listsexisted in ancient China and Japan. In Buddhism the four great elements, to which two others are sometimes added,are not viewed as substances, but as categories of sensory experience.

Classical elements in BabyloniaThe concept of the four classical elements in the Western tradition originates from Babylonian mythology. TheEnma Eli, a text written between the 18th and 16th centuries BC, describes four cosmic elements: the sea, earth,sky, and wind.[2]

Classical elements in GreeceThe Greek classical elements (Earth, Water, Air, Fire, and Aether) date from pre-Socratic times and persistedthroughout the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance, deeply influencing European thought and culture. The Greekfive elements are sometimes associated with the five platonic solids.

Hellenic Physics

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Hellenic civilization elements fire earth air water

Plato characterizes the elements as being pre-Socratic in origin from a list created by the Sicilian philosopherEmpedocles (ca. 450 BC). Empedocles called these the four "roots" (, rhizmata). Plato seems to havebeen the first to use the term "element (, stoicheion)" in reference to air, fire, earth, and water.[3] Theancient Greek word for element, stoicheion (from stoicheo, "to line up") meant "smallest division (of a sun-dial), asyllable", as the composing unit of an alphabet it could denote a letter and the smallest unit from which a word isformed.According to Aristotle in his On Generation and Corruption: Air is primarily wet and secondarily hot. Fire is primarily hot and secondarily dry. Earth is primarily dry and secondarily cold. Water is primarily cold and secondarily wet.One classic diagram (above) has one square inscribed in the other, with the corners of one being the classicalelements, and the corners of the other being the properties. The opposite corner is the opposite of these properties,"hot - cold" and "dry - wet".According to Galen, these elements were used by Hippocrates in describing the human body with an association withthe four humours: yellow bile (fire), black bile (earth), blood (air), and phlegm (water).

Classical elements in HinduismThe pancha mahabhuta, or "five great elements", of Hinduism are kshiti or bhmi (earth), ap or jala (water), tejas oragni (fire), marut or pavan (air or wind), byom or shunya (or akash?) (aether or void). Hindus believe that all ofcreation, including the human body, is made up of these five essential elements and that upon death, the human bodydissolves into these five elements of nature, thereby balancing the cycle of nature set in motion by the Creator.Hindus believe that the Creator used akasha (ether), the most "subtle" element, to create the other four traditionalelements; each element created is in turn used to create the next element, each less subtle than the last. The fiveelements are associated with the five senses, and act as the gross medium for the experience of sensations. The basestelement, Earth, created using all the other elements, can be perceived by all five senses - hearing, touch, sight, taste,and smell. The next higher element, water, has no odor but can be heard, felt, seen and tasted. Next comes fire,which can be heard, felt and seen. Air can be heard and felt. "Akasha" (ether) is the medium of sound but isinaccessible to all other senses.

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Buddhist elementsIn the Pali literature, the mahabhuta ("great elements") or catudhatu ("four elements") are earth, water, fire and air.In early Buddhism, the four elements are a basis for understanding suffering and for liberating oneself fromsuffering. The earliest Buddhist texts explain that the four primary material elements are the sensory qualitiessolidity, fluidity, temperature, and mobility; their characterization as earth, water, fire, and air, respectively, isdeclared an abstractioninstead of concentrating on the fact of material existence, one observes how a physicalthing is sensed, felt, perceived.[4]

The Buddha's teaching regarding the four elements is to be understood as the base of all observation of realsensations rather than as a philosophy. The four properties are cohesion (water), solidity or inertia (earth), expansionor vibration (air) and heat or energy content (fire). He promulgated a categorization of mind and matter as composedof eight types of "kalapas" of which the four elements are primary and a secondary group of four are color, smell,taste, and nutriment which are derivative from the four primaries.The Buddha's teaching of the four elements does predate Greek teaching of the same four elements. This is possiblyexplained by the fact that he sent out 60 arahants to the known world to spread his teaching; however it differs in thefact that the Buddha taught that the four elements are false and that form is in fact made up of much smaller particleswhich are constantly changing.Thanissaro Bhikkhu (1997) renders an extract of Shakyamuni Buddha's from Pali into English thus:

Just as a skilled butcher or his apprentice, having killed a cow, would sit at a crossroads cutting it up intopieces, the monk contemplates this very body -- however it stands, however it is disposed -- in terms ofproperties: 'In this body there is the earth property, the liquid property, the fire property, & the windproperty.'[5]

Seven chakrasIn the philosophy of the seven chakras there are correspondences to the five elements as shared by both Hinduismand Buddhism as well as two other elements: Sahasrara (Crown): Thought/Space Aja (Third Eye): Light/Dark Vishuddhi (Throat): Ether/Sound Anahata (Heart): Air Manipura (Navel): Fire Svadhisthana (Sacral): Water Muladhara (Root): Earth

Bn elementsIn Bn or ancient Tibetan philosophy, the five elemental processes of earth, water, fire, air and space are theessential materials of all existent phenomena or aggregates. The elemental processes form the basis of the calendar,astrology, medicine, psychology and are the foundation of the spiritual traditions of shamanism, tantra andDzogchen.Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche states that

physical properties are assigned to the elements: earth is solidity; water is cohesion; fire is temperature; air is motion; and space is the spatial dimension that accommodates the other four active elements. In addition, the elements are correlated to different emotions, temperaments, directions, colors, tastes, body types, illnesses, thinking styles, and character. From the five elements arise the five senses and the five fields of sensual experience; the five negative emotions and the five wisdoms; and the five extensions of the body. They are the five primary pranas or vital energies. They are the constituents of every physical, sensual, mental, and

Classical element 12

spiritual phenomenon.[6]

The names of the elements are analogous to categorised experiential sensations of the natural world. The names aresymbolic and key to their inherent qualities and/or modes of action by analogy. In Bn the elemental processes arefundamental metaphors for working with external, internal and secret energetic forces. All five elemental processesin their essential purity are inherent in the mindstream and link the trikaya and are aspects of primordial energy. AsHerbert V. Gnther states:

Thus, bearing in mind that thought struggles incessantly against the treachery of language and that what weobserve and describe is the observer himself [sic.], we may nonetheless proceed to investigate the successivephases in our becoming human beings. Throughout these phases, the experience (das Erlebnis) of ourselves asan intensity (imaged and felt as a "god", lha) setting up its own spatiality (imaged and felt as a "house" khang)is present in various intensities of illumination that occur within ourselves as a "temple." A corollary of thisErlebnis is its light character manifesting itself in various "frequencies" or colors. This is to say, since we arebeings of light we display this light in a multiplicity of nuances.[7]

In the above block quote the trikaya is encoded as: dharmakaya "god"; sambhogakaya "temple" and nirmanakaya"house".

Chinese elementsThe Chinese had a somewhat different series of elements, namely Fire, Earth, Water, Metal and Wood, which wereunderstood as different types of energy in a state of constant interaction and flux with one another, rather than theWestern notion of different kinds of material.Although it is usually translated as "element", the Chinese word xing literally means something like "changing statesof being", "permutations" or "metamorphoses of being".[8] In fact Sinologists cannot agree on one single translation.The Chinese conception of "element" is therefore quite different from the Western one. The Western elements wereseen as the basic building blocks of matter. The Chinese, by contrast, were seen as ever changing and moving forcesor energiesone translation of wu xing is simply "the five changes".The Wu Xing are chiefly an ancient mnemonic device for systems with five stages; hence the preferred translation of"movements", "phases" or "steps" over "elements."In Taoism there is a similar system of elements, which includes metal and wood, but excludes air, which is replacedwith qi, which is a force or energy rather than an element. In Chinese philosophy the universe consists of heaven andearth, heaven being made of qi and earth being made of the five elements (in the Chinese view, the attributes andproperties of the Western and Indian Air element are equivalent to that of Wood, where the element of Ether is oftenseen as a correspondent to Metal). The five major planets are associated with and named after the elements: Venus is Metal (), Jupiter is Wood (), Mercury is Water (), Mars is Fire (), and Saturn is Earth (). Additionally, the Moon represents Yin (), and the Sun represents Yang (). Yin, Yang,and the five elements are recurring themes in the I Ching, the oldest of Chinese classical texts which describes anancient system of cosmology and philosophy. The five elements also play an important part in Chinese astrology andthe Chinese form of geomancy known as Feng shui

The doctrine of five phases describes two cycles of balance, a generating or creation (, shng) cycle and anovercoming or destruction (/, k) cycle of interactions between the phases.Generating

Wood feeds fire; Fire creates earth (ash); Earth bears metal; Metal collects water; Water nourishes wood.

Classical element 13

Overcoming

Wood parts earth; Earth absorbs water; Water quenches fire; Fire melts metal; Metal chops wood.There are also two cycles of imbalance, an overacting cycle (cheng) and an insulting cycle (wu).

Japanese elements

Japanese traditions use a set of elements called the (go dai, literally "five great"). These five are earth, water,fire, wind/air, and void. These came from Buddhist beliefs; the classical Chinese elements (, go gy) are alsoprominent in Japanese culture, especially to the influential Neo-Confucianists during the Edo period. Earth represented things that were solid. Water represented things that were liquid. Fire represented things that destroyed. Air represented things that moved. Heaven represented things not of our everyday life.

Elements in Medieval alchemyThe elemental system used in Medieval alchemy was developed by the Arabic alchemist, Jbir ibn Hayyn andothers.[9] His original system consisted of the four classical elements found in the ancient Greek traditions (air, earth,fire and water), in addition to two philosophical elements: sulphur, the stone which burns, which characterized theprinciple of combustibility, and mercury, which contained the idealized principle of metallic properties. The threemetallic principles: sulphur to flammability or combustion, mercury to volatility and stability, and salt to solidity.became the tri prima of the Swiss alchemist Paracelsus, who reasoned that Aristotles four element theory appearedin bodies as three principles. Paracelsus saw these principles as fundamental, and justified them by recourse to thedescription of how wood burns in fire. Mercury included the cohesive principle, so that when it left in smoke thewood fell apart. Smoke described the volatility (the mercury principle), the heat-giving flames describedflammability (sulphur), and the remnant ash described solidity (salt).[10]

Modern elementsThe Aristotelian tradition and medieval Alchemy eventually gave rise to modern scientific theories and newtaxonomies. By the time of Antoine Lavoisier, for example, a list of elements would no longer refer to classicalelements.[11] The classical elements correspond more closely to four states of matter: solid, liquid, gas, and plasma.

1s, 2s, 2px,2p

y, and 2p

z.

The shapes of the first five atomic orbitals using color to depict the phase of thewavefunction.

Modern science recognizes classes ofelementary particles which have nosubstructure, (or rather, particles that aren'tmade of other particles), and compositeparticles having substructure, (particlesmade of other particles). The StandardModel of quantum mechanics defines threeclasses of elementary subatomic particles:quarks and leptons, (matter-like particles),

Classical element 14

and gauge bosons (energy-like force carriers). Quarks are divided into six types: up, down, top, bottom, strange andcharm; and leptons are similarly divided into six types: electron, electron neutrino, muon, muon neutrino, tau andtau neutrino. The types of force carriers include: photon, W and Z boson, gluon and some quantification of a Higgsboson.

Elements in western astrology and tarotWestern astrology uses the four classical elements in connection with astrological charts and horoscopes. The twelvesigns of the zodiac are divided into the four elements: Fire signs are Aries, Leo and Sagittarius, Earth signs areTaurus, Virgo and Capricorn, Air signs are Gemini, Libra and Aquarius, and Water signs are Cancer, Scorpio, andPisces.In divinatory tarot, the suits of cups, swords, batons/wands, and discs/coins are said to correspond to water, air, fire,and earth respectively.

ReferencesGeneral information Paul Strathern (2000). Mendeleyevs Dream the Quest for the Elements [12]. New York: Berkley Books.Footnotes[1] G. E. R. Lloyd (1968). Aristotle: The Growth and Structure of his Thought. Cambridge Univ. Pr.. pp.133139. ISBN0-521-09456-9.[2] Francesca Rochberg (December 2002). "A consideration of Babylonian astronomy within the historiography of science". Studies in History

and Philosophy of Science 33 (4): 661684. doi:10.1016/S0039-3681(02)00022-5.[3] "Timaeus" (http:/ / www. perseus. tufts. edu/ cgi-bin/ ptext?lookup=Plat. + Tim. + 48b). .[4] Dan Lusthaus. "What is and isn't Yogacara" (http:/ / www. acmuller. net/ yogacara/ articles/ intro-uni. htm). .[5] Majjhima Nikaya. "Kayagata-sati Sutta" (http:/ / www. accesstoinsight. org/ tipitaka/ mn/ mn. 119. than. html). p. 119. . Retrieved

2009-01-30.[6] Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche (2002). Healing with Form, Energy, and Light. Ithaca, New York: Snow Lion Publications. p.1.

ISBN1559391766.[7] Herber V. Gnther (1996). The Teachings of Padmasambhava (Hardcover ed.). Leiden, Netherlands: E. J. Brill. pp.115116.[8] Wolfram Eberhard (1986). A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols. London: Routledge and Keegan Paul. pp.93, 105, 309. ISBN0710201915.[9] Norris, John A. (2006). "The Mineral Exhalation Theory of Metallogenesis in Pre-Modern Mineral Science". Ambix 53: 43.

doi:10.1179/174582306X93183.[10] Strathern, 2000. Page 79.[11] Antoine Lavoisier (1743-1794) (http:/ / web. lemoyne. edu/ ~giunta/ lavtable. html), in Classic Chemistry (http:/ / web. lemoyne. edu/

~giunta/ index. html), compiled by Carmen Giunta[12] http:/ / books. google. com/ books?id=qCzoF9sjTkAC

External links Section on 4 elements in Buddhism (http:/ / www. accesstoinsight. org/ lib/ authors/ khin/ wheel231. html)

Ionian School (philosophy) 15

Ionian School (philosophy)

Map of ancient Ionia, on the eastern side of theAegean Sea.

The Ionian school, a type of Greek philosophy centred in Miletus,Ionia in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE, is something of a misnomer.Although Ionia was a centre of Western philosophy, the scholars itproduced, including Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Heraclitus,Anaxagoras, Archelaus, and Diogenes of Apollonia,[1] had suchdiverse viewpoints that it cannot be said to be a specific school ofphilosophy. Aristotle called them physiologoi meaning 'those whodiscoursed on nature', but he did not group them together as an "Ionianschool". The classification can be traced to the 2nd century historian ofphilosophy Sotion. They are sometimes referred to as cosmologists,since they were largely physicalists who tried to explain the nature ofmatter.

While some of these scholars are included in the Milesian school ofphilosophy, others are more difficult to categorize.

Most cosmologists thought that although matter can change from oneform to another, all matter has something in common which does notchange. They did not agree what it was that all things had in common,and did not experiment to find out, but used abstract reasoning rather than religion or mythology to explainthemselves, thus becoming the first philosophers in the Western tradition.

Later philosophers widened their studies to include other areas of thought. The Eleatic school, for example, alsostudied epistemology, or how people come to know what exists. But the Ionians were the first group of philosophersthat we know of, and so remain historically important.

ThalesThales (Greek: ) of Miletus (ca. 624 BCE - 546 BCE) is regarded as the earliest western philosopher. BeforeThales, the Greeks explained the origin and nature of the world through myths of anthropomorphic gods and heroes.Phenomena like lightning or earthquakes were attributed to actions of the gods. By contrast, Thales attempted to findnaturalistic explanations of the world, without reference to the supernatural. He explained earthquakes by imaginingthat the Earth floats on water, and that earthquakes occur when the Earth is rocked by waves. Thales' most famousbelief was his cosmological doctrine, which held that the world originated from water.

Ionian School (philosophy) 16

AnaximanderAnaximander (Greek: ) (610 BCE ca. 546 BCE) wrote a cosmological work, little of whichremains. From the few extant fragments, we learn that he believed the beginning or first principle (arche, a word firstfound in Anaximander's writings, and which he probably invented) is an endless, unlimited mass (apeiron), subjectto neither old age nor decay, which perpetually yields fresh materials from which everything we can perceive isderived.

AnaximenesAnaximenes (Greek: ) of Miletus (585 BCE - 528 BCE) held that the air, with its variety of contents, itsuniversal presence, its vague associations in popular fancy with the phenomena of life and growth, is the source ofall that exists. Everything is air at different degrees of density, and under the influence of heat, which expands, andof cold, which contracts its volume, it gives rise to the several phases of existence. The process is gradual, and takesplace in two directions, as heat or cold predominates. In this way was formed a broad disk of earth, floating on thecircumambient air. Similar condensations produced the sun and stars; and the flaming state of these bodies is due tothe velocity of their motions.

HeraclitusHeraclitus (Greek: ) of Ephesus (ca. 535 - 475 BCE) disagreed with Thales, Anaximander, andPythagoras about the nature of the ultimate substance and claimed instead that everything is derived from the Greekclassical element fire, rather than from air, water, or earth. This led to the belief that change is real, and stabilityillusory. For Heraclitus "Everything flows, nothing stands still." He is also famous for saying: "No man can cross thesame river twice, because neither the man nor the river are the same."

EmpedoclesEmpedocles (ca. 490 BCE ca. 430 BCE) was a citizen of Agrigentum, a Greek colony in Sicily. Empedocles'philosophy is best known for being the origin of the cosmogenic theory of the four classical elements. He maintainedthat all matter is made up of four elements: water, earth, air and fire. Empedocles postulated forces called Love(philia) and Strife (neikos) to explain the attraction and separation of different forms of matter. He was also one ofthe first people to state the theory that light travels at a finite (although very large) speed.

AnaxagorasAnaxagoras of Clazomenae (ca. 500-428 BCE) regarded material substance as an infinite multitude of imperishableprimary elements, referring all generation and disappearance to mixture and separation respectively. All substance isordered by an ordering force, the cosmic mind (nous).

ArchelausArchelaus was a Greek philosopher of the 5th century BCE, born probably in Athens. He was a pupil of Anaxagoras,and is said by Ion of Chios (Diogenes Lartius, ii. 23) to have been the teacher of Socrates. Some argue that this isprobably only an attempt to connect Socrates with the Ionian School; others (e.g. Gomperz, Greek Thinkers) upholdthe story. There is similar difference of opinion as regards the statement that Archelaus formulated certain ethicaldoctrines. In general, he followed Anaxagoras, but in his cosmology he went back to the earlier Ionians.

Ionian School (philosophy) 17

HippoHippo (ca. 425 BCE) was native of Magna Graecia (Italy). Very little is known about him. He held that water wasthe principle of all things, with fire springing from water, and then developing itself by generating the universe.Primarily interested in biological matters, he was said to have been an atheist.

Diogenes of ApolloniaDiogenes (ca. 425 BCE) was a native of Apollonia, either the one in Crete or in Thrace. Like Anaximenes, hebelieved air to be the one source of all being, and all other substances to be derived from it by condensation andrarefaction. His chief advance upon the doctrines of Anaximenes is that he asserted air, the primal force, to bepossessed of intelligence"the air which stirred within him not only prompted, but instructed. The air as the originof all things is necessarily an eternal, imperishable substance, but as soul it is also necessarily endowed withconsciousness."

Notes[1] American International Encyclopedia, J.J. Little Co., New York 1954, Vol VIII

External links Catholic Encyclopedia Entry (http:/ / www. newadvent. org/ cathen/ 08092a. htm) Ionian School Of Philosophy (http:/ / www. 1911encyclopedia. org/ Ionian_School_Of_Philosophy),

Encyclopdia Britannica, 11th Edition, 1911

References This articleincorporates text from a publication now in the public domain:Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911).

Encyclopdia Britannica (Eleventh ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Paired opposites 18

Paired oppositesPaired opposites are an ancient, pre-Socratic method of establishing thesis, antithesis and synthesis in terms of astandard for what is right and proper in natural philosophy.

Relative absolutesFrom the very beginnings absolutes are named as gods and paired opposites taken as consorts light and darkness areassociated with relative absolutes such as air as air, earth, fire and water, whose noun based relational synthesis givesbirth to new ranges of adjective and adverbial qualitative paired opposites.Where for example, power andwisdom give birth to justice, we have aqualitative rather than strictly scalarsynthesis. Paired adjectives andadverbs implying a change in statetoward for example wetness or drynessare further expanded through theirrelative absolutes to be conditional ordependent on a process of becoming orchanging towards a well orderedbalance.

Going back to the Egyptian concept ofMa'at [1] and the Pythagoreans [2] thereis an idea that what is beautiful andpleasing should be proportionate to astandard and with the Greeks theexpansion on that idea that the moregeneral and formulaic the standards thebetter. This idea that there should bebeauty and elegance evidenced by a skillful composition of well understood elements underlies mathematics ingeneral and in a sense all the modulors of design as well. The idea is that what makes proportions pleasing tohumans in categories such as the architecture of buildings music, art, and mathematical proofs is their being scaleddown to dimensions humans can relate to and scaled up through distances humans can travel as a procession ofrevelations which may sometimes invoke closure, or glimpses of views that go beyond any encompassing frameworkand thus suggest to the observer that there is something more besides, invoking wonder and awe.

The classical standards are a series of paired opposites designed to expand the dimensional constraints of theharmony and proportion. In the Greek ideal Vitruvius addresses they are similarity, difference, motion, rest, number,sequence and consequence.These are incorporated in good architectural design as philosophical categorization; what similarity is of the essencethat makes it what it is, and what difference is it that makes it not something else? Is the size of a column or an archrelated just to the structural load it bears or more broadly to the presence and purpose of the space itself?The standard of motion originally referred to encompassing change but has now been expanded to buildings whosekinetic mechanisms may actually determine change depend upon harmonies of wind, humidity, temperature, sound,light, time of day or night, and previous cycles of change.

Paired opposites 19

The stability of the architectural standard of the universal set of proportions references the totality of the builtenvironment so that even as it changes it does so in an ongoing and continuous process that can be measured,weighed, and judged as to its orderly harmony.Sacred geometry has the same arrangement of elements found in compositions of music and nature at its finestincorporating light and shadow, sound and silence, texture and smoothness, mass and airy lightness, as in a forestglade where the leaves move gently on the wind or a sparkle of metal catches the eye as a ripple of water on a pond.

Paired opposites in the proportions of unitsScalar ranges and coordinate systems are paired opposites within sets. Incorporating dimensions of positive andnegative numbers and exponents, or expanding x,y and z coordinates, by adding a fourth dimension of time allows aresolution of position relative to the standard of the scale which is often taken as 0,0,0,0 with additional dimensionsadded as referential scales are expanded from space and time to mass and energy.Ancient systems frequently scaled their degree of opposition by rate of increase or rate of decrease. Linear increasewas enhanced by doubling systems. An acceleration in the rate of increase or decrease could be analyzedarithmetrically, geometrically, or through a wide range of other numerical and physical analysis. Arithmetic andgeometric series, and other methods of rating proportionate expansion or contraction could be thought of asconvergent or divergent toward a position.Though unit quantities were first defined by spatial dimensions, and then expanded by adding coordinates of time,the weight or mass a given spatial dimension could contain was also considered and even in antiquity, conditionsunder which the standard would be established such as at a given temperature, distance from sea level, or densitywere added.Rates of change over time were then considered as either indexes of production or depletion

Paired opposites in rates of increase and decreaseThe concept of balance vs chaos can be thought of as particle vs wave. The particle minimizes change even when inmotion. The wave accentuates change by increasing or decreasing. Relative change may result in one dimensionincreasing as another decreases or one rate of change increasing as another decreases.

Law and orderAs the natural order of things gives rise to consensus as to what is right and proper and what is by contrast wrong,evil, or bad; societally, mathematically, philosophically and scientifically it becomes necessary to establish standardsand orders of magnitude by which something may be evaluated as in or out of tolerance

References Howard W. Eves (1969). In Mathematical Circles. Prindle. Weber, and Schmidt. ISBN87150-056-8. Lucas N. H. Bunt, Phillip S.Jones, Jack D. Bedient (1976). The Historical Roots of Elementary Mathematics.

Dover. ISBN0486255638. Includes references to a Days Journey and a Days Sail H Arthur Klein (1976). The World of Measurements. Simon and Schuster.Includes references to a Days Journey

and a Days Sail Francis H. Moffitt (1987). Surveying. Harper & Row. ISBN0060445548. Vitruvius The Ten Books on Architecture. Dover. 1960. Claudias Ptolemy The Geography. Dover. 1991. ISBN048626896. 25. Herodotus The History. William Brown. 1952.

Paired opposites 20

Michael Grant (1987). The Rise of the Greeks. Charles Scribners Sons. R. A. Cordingley (1951). Norman's Parallel of the Orders of Architecture. Alex Trianti Ltd. H Johnathan Riley Smith (1990). The Atlas of the Crusades place names in Canaan during the crusades.

Swanston. ISBN0723003610. H.W. Koch (1978). Medieval Warfare. Prentice Hall. ISBN0135736005. William H McNeil and Jean W Sedlar (1962). The Ancient Near East. OUP. Andrew George (2000). The Epic of Gillgamesh. Penguin. ISBNNo14-044721-0. James B. Pritchard (1968). The Ancient Near East. OUP. Shaika Haya Ali Al Khalifa and Michael Rice (1986). Bahrain through the Ages. KPI. ISBN071030112-x. Michael Roaf (1990). Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East. Equinox. ISBN0-8160-2218-6. Nicholas Awde and Putros Samano (1986). The Arabic Alphabet. Billing & Sons Ltd.. ISBN0863560350. Gerard Herm (1975). The Phoenicians. William Morrow^ Co. Inc.. ISBN0-688-02908-6. Gardiner (1990). Egyptian Grammar. Griffith Institute. ISBN0900416351. Antonio Loprieno (1995). Ancient Egyptian. CUP. ISBN0-521-44849-2. Michael Rice (1990). Egypt's Making. Routledge. ISBN0-415-06454-6. Gillings (1972). Mathematics in the time of the Pharaohs. MIT Press. ISBN0262070456. Somers Clarke and R. Englebach (1990). Ancient Egyptian Construction and Architecture. Dover.

ISBN0486264858. Marie-Loise Thomsen (1984). Mesopotamia 10 The Sumerian Language. Academic Press. ISBN87-500-3654-8. Silvia Luraghi (1990). Old Hittite Sentence Structure. Routledge. ISBN0415047358. J. P. Mallory (1989). In Search of the Indo Europeans. Thames and Hudson. ISBN050027616-1. Anne H. Groton (1995). From Alpha to Omega. Focus Information group. ISBN0941051382. Hines (1981). Our Latin Heritage. Harcourt Brace. ISBN0153894687.

Footnotes[1] Wallis Budge, Gods of the Egyptians Vol I and 2[2] Prindle. Weber, and Schmidt In Mathematical Circles

Material monism 21

Material monismMaterial monism is a Presocratic belief which provides an explanation of the physical world by saying that all ofthe world's objects are composed of a single element. Among the material monists were the three Milesianphilosophers: Thales, who believed that everything was composed of water; Anaximander, who believed it wasapeiron; and Anaximenes, who believed it was air.Although their ideas seem farfetched, these philosophers were the first to give an explanation of the physical worldwithout referencing the supernatural; this opened the way for all modern science (and philosophy), which has thesame goal of explaining the world without dependence on the supernatural.Some modern theorists, such as Albert Einstein, have searched for a theory that explains the world as the product ofa single substance, but at a deeper level, one that is beneath the structure of atoms and even quarks.

Diogenes LartiusDiogenes Laertius (ancient Greek: , Diogenes Laertios; fl. c. 3rd century) was a biographer ofthe Greek philosophers. Nothing is known about his life, but his surviving Lives and Opinions of EminentPhilosophers is one of the principal surviving sources for the history of Greek philosophy.

LifeNothing is definitively known about his life. He must have lived after Sextus Empiricus (c. 200 AD), whom hementions, and before Stephanus of Byzantium and Sopater (c. 500 AD), who quote him. His work makes no mentionof Neoplatonism, even though it is addressed to a woman who was "an enthusiastic Platonist."[1] It is probable thathe flourished in the first half of the third century, during the reign of Alexander Severus (222235) and hissuccessors.The precise form of his name is uncertain. In the ancient manuscripts of his work, he is invariably referred to as"Laertius Diogenes," and this form of the name is repeated by Sopater,[2] and the Suda.[3] The modern form"Diogenes Laertius" is much rarer, and occurs in Stephanus of Byzantium,[4] and in a lemma to the GreekAnthology.[5] He is also referred to as "Laertes,"[6] or just "Diogenes."[7]

The origin of his name "Laertius" is equally uncertain. Stephanus of Byzantium, in one passage, refers to him as"Diogenes of Laertieus,"[8] implying that he was the native of some town, perhaps the Laerte in Caria, or the one inCilicia. An alternative suggestion is that one of his ancestors had for a patron a member of the Roman family of theLartii.[9] The modern theory is that "Laertius" is a nickname, to distinguish him from the many other people calledDiogenes in the ancient world, and derived from the Homeric epithet "Diogenes Laertiade," used in addressingOdysseus.[10]

His home town is unknown, assuming that his name does not refer to his place of origin. A disputed passage in hiswritings[11] has been used to suggest that it was Nicaea in Bithynia.[12]

WritingsThe work by which he is known, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, was written in Greek and professes to give an account of the lives and sayings of the Greek philosophers. Although it is at best an uncritical and unphilosophical compilation, its value, as giving us an insight into the private lives of the Greek sages, led Montaigne to exclaim that he wished that instead of one Lartius there had been a dozen.[13] On the other hand, modern scholars advise that we treat Diogenes' testimonia with care, especially when he fails to cite his sources: "Diogenes has acquired an importance out of all proportion to his merits because the loss of many primary sources

Diogenes Lartius 22

and of the earlier secondary compilations has accidentally left him the chief continuous source for the history ofGreek philosophy."[14]

Diogenes treats his subject in two divisions which he describes as the Ionian and the Italian schools; the division issomewhat dubious and appears to be drawn from the lost doxography of Sotion. The biographies of the former beginwith Anaximander, and end with Clitomachus, Theophrastus and Chrysippus; the latter begins with Pythagoras, andends with Epicurus. The Socratic school, with its various branches, is classed with the Ionic; while the Eleatics andsceptics are treated under the Italic. From the statements of Walter Burley (a 14th-century monk) in his De vita etmoribus philosophorum the text of Diogenes seems to have been much fuller than that which we now possess.His own opinions are uncertain. It has been suggested that Diogenes was an Epicurean, or a Skeptic. In favour of theview that he was an Epicurean, is the fact that he passionately defends Epicurus.[15] Book 10, which discussesEpicurus, is of high quality, and contains three long letters, written by Epicurus, which explain Epicureandoctrines.[16] In favour of the view that he was a Skeptic, is the way in which he is impartial to all the schools in themanner of the ancient skeptics, and he carries the succession of the school further than the other schools. At onepoint, he even seems to refer to the Skeptics as "our school."[11] On the other hand, most of these points can beexplained by the way he uncritically copies from his sources. It is impossible to be certain that he adhered to anyschool, and he is usually more interested in biographical details than in philosophical doctrines.[17]

In addition to the Lives, Diogenes was the author of a work in verse on famous men, in various metres.

Notes[1] Diogenes Lartius, iii. 47[2] Sopater, ap. Photius, Biblioth. 161[3] Suda, Tetralogia[4] Stephanus of Byzantium, Druidai[5] Lemma to Anthologia Palatina, vii. 95[6] Eustathius, on Iliad, M. 153[7] Stephanus of Byzantium, Enetoi[8] Stephanus of Byzantium, Cholleidai[9] " Diogenes Laertius (http:/ / www. ancientlibrary. com/ smith-bio/ 1028. html)" entry, in William Smith (editor), (1870), Dictionary of Greek

and Roman Biography and Mythology[10] Herbert S. Long, Introduction, page xvi, in the 1972 reprint of Diogenes Lartius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Volume 1, Loeb Classical

Library[11] Diogenes Lartius, ix. 109. Specifically, Diogenes refers to "our Apollonides of Nicaea," this is conjectured to mean either "my

fellow-citizen" or "a Sceptic like myself."[12] Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Volume 4, (1998), page 86.[13] Montaigne, Essays II.10 "Of Books" (http:/ / www. uoregon. edu/ ~rbear/ montaigne/ 2x. htm).[14] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", page xix, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library[15] Diogenes Laertius, x. 3-12[16] Diogenes Laertius, x. 34-135[17] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", pages xvii-xviii, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library

Works Critical edition: Diogenis Laertii Vitae philosophorum edidit Miroslav Marcovich, Stuttgart-Lipsia, Teubner,

1999-2002. Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana, vol. 1: Books IX; vol. 2: ExcerptaByzantina; v. 3: Indices by Hans Grtner

Trans. R. D. Hicks, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, I, 1925. Harvard University Press, Loeb Classical Library,ISBN 978-0-674-99203-0

Trans. R. D. Hicks, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, II, 1925. Harvard University Press, Loeb Classical Library,ISBN 978-0-674-99204-7

Diogenes Lartius 23

Bibliography Barnes, Jonathan, "Diogenes Laertius IX 61-116: the philosophy of Pyrrhonism" in W. Haase and H. Temporini

(ed.) Aufstieg und Niedergang der rmischen Welt, II 36.6 (de Gruyter: Berlin/New York, 1992): pp.42414301. Mansfeld, Jaap, Diogenes Laertius on Stoic philosophy Elenchos, 1986, VII: 295-382. Mejer, Jrgen, Diogenes Laertius and his Hellenistic background. Wiesbaden, Steiner, 1978. Mejer, Jrgen Diogenes Laertius and the transmission of Greek philosophy in W. Haase and H. Temporini (ed.)

Aufstieg und Niedergang der rmischen Welt, II 36.5 (de Gruyter: Berlin/New York, 1992): pp.35563662. Sollenberger, Michael The lives of the Peripatetics: an analysis of the contents and structure of Diogenes

Laertius' Vitae philosophorum Book 5 in W. Haase and H. Temporini (ed.) Aufstieg und Niedergang derrmischen Welt, II 36.6 (de Gruyter: Berlin/New York, 1992): pp.37933879.

External links Diogenes Lartius, Lives of the Eminent Philosophers, translated by Robert Drew Hicks (1925), Loeb Classical

Library. Diogenes Lartius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (http:/ / classicpersuasion. org/ pw/ diogenes/ ),

translated by Charles Duke Yonge (1853) (Uses a different method of enumerating the sections from the moderneditions.)

Ancient Greek text of Diogenes' Lives (http:/ / www. mikrosapoplous. gr/ dl/ dl. html) Article on the Manuscript versions (http:/ / www. tertullian. org/ rpearse/ manuscripts/ diogenes_laertius. htm) at

the Tertullian Project A bibliography on the Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (http:/ / www. ontology. co/ biblio/

diogenes-laertius-biblio. htm)

Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers

Dionysiou monastery, codex 90, a 13th centurymanuscript containing selections from Herodotus,

Plutarch and (shown here) Diogenes Laertius

Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (Greek: ) is a biography of theGreek philosophers by Diogenes Lartius, written in Greek, perhaps inthe first half of the third century AD.

Overview

The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, was written in Greekand professes to give an account of the lives and sayings of the Greekphilosophers. The work doesn't have an exact title in the manuscriptsand appears in various lengthy forms.

Although it is at best an uncritical and unphilosophical compilation, itsvalue, as giving us an insight into the private lives of the Greek sages, led Montaigne to write that he wished thatinstead of one Lartius there had been a dozen.[1] On the other hand, modern scholars have advised that we treatDiogenes' testimonia with care, especially when he fails to cite his sources: "Diogenes has acquired an importanceout of all proportion to his merits because the loss of many primary sources and of the earlier secondary compilationshas accidentally left him the chief continuous source for the history of Greek philosophy."[2]

Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers 24

Organization of the workLartius treats his subject in two divisions which he describes as the Ionian and the Italian schools. The biographiesof the former begin with Anaximander, and end with Clitomachus, Theophrastus and Chrysippus; the latter beginswith Pythagoras, and ends with Epicurus. The Socratic school, with its various branches, is classed with the Ionic;while the Eleatics and sceptics are treated under the Italic. He also includes his own poetic verse, albeit pedestrian,about the philosophers he discusses.

Books 1-7: Ionian Philosophy

Book 1: The Seven Sages

Thales, Solon, Chilon, Pittacus, Bias, Cleobulus, Periander, Anacharsis, Myson, Epimenides, Pherecydes

Book 2: Socrates, with predecessors and followers

Anaximander, Anaximenes, Anaxagoras, Archelaus, Socrates, Xenophon, Aeschines, Aristippus, Phaedo, Euclides, Stilpo, Crito, Simon, Glaucon,Simmias, Cebes, Menedemus of Eretria

Book 3: Plato

Plato

Book 4: The Academy

Speusippus, Xenocrates, Polemo, Crates of Athens, Crantor, Arcesilaus, Bion, Lacydes, Carneades, Clitomachus

Book 5: The Peripatetics

Aristotle, Theophrastus, Strato, Lyco, Demetrius, Heraclides

Book 6: The Cynics

Antisthenes, Diogenes of Sinope, Monimus, Onesicritus, Crates of Thebes, Metrocles, Hipparchia, Menippus, Menedemus

Book 7: The Stoics

Zeno of Citium, Aristo, Herillus, Dionysius, Cleanthes, Sphaerus, Chrysippus

Books 8-10: Italian Philosophy

Book 8: Pythagoreans

Pythagoras, Empedocles, Epicharmus, Archytas, Alcmaeon, Hippasus, Philolaus, Eudoxus

Book 9: Uncategorized (Eleatics, Atomists, Skeptics, etc.)

Heraclitus, Xenophanes, Parmenides, Melissus, Zeno of Elea, Leucippus, Democritus, Protagoras, Diogenes of Apollonia, Anaxarchus, Pyrrho,Timon

Book 10: Epicurus

Epicurus

The work contains incidental remarks on many other philosophers, and there are useful accounts concerningHegesias, Anniceris, and Theodorus (Cyrenaics);[3] Persaeus (Stoic);[4] and Metrodorus and Hermarchus(Epicureans).[5] Book VII is incomplete and breaks off during the life of Chrysippus. From a table of contents in oneof the manuscripts (manuscript P), this book is known to have continued with Zeno of Tarsus, Diogenes,Apollodorus, Boethus, Mnesarchides, Mnasagoras, Nestor, Basilides, Dardanus, Antipater, Heraclides, Sosigenes,Panaetius, Hecato, Posidonius, Athenodorus, another Athenodorus, Antipater, Arius, and Cornutus. The whole ofBook X is devoted to Epicurus, and contains three long letters written by Epicurus, which explain Epicureandoctrines.His chief authorities were Favorinus and Diocles of Magnesia, but his work also draws (either directly or indirectly) on books by Antisthenes of Rhodes, Alexander Polyhistor, and Demetrius of Magnesia, as well as works by Hippobotus, Aristippus, Panaetius, Apollodorus, Sosicrates, Satyrus, Sotion, Neanthes, Hermippus, Antigonus,

Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers 25

Heraclides, Hieronymus, and Pamphila[6] [7] From the statements of the pseudo-Burlaeus, in the 14th-century workDe vita et moribus philosophorum, the text of Diogenes seems to have been much fuller than that which we nowpossess.

Manuscript editionsThere are many extant manuscripts of the Lives, although none of them are especially old, and they all descend froma common ancestor, because they all lack the end of Book VII.[8] The three most useful manuscripts are known as B,P, and F. Manuscript B (Codex Borbonicus) dates from the 12th century, and is in the National Library of Naples.[9]

Manuscript P (Paris) and manuscript F (Florence) are probably a little younger.[10]

There seem to have been some early Latin translations, which have no longer survived. A 10th century work entitledTractatus de dictis philosophorum shows some knowledge of Diogenes.[11] Henry Aristippus, in the 12th century, isknown to have translated at least some of the work into Latin, and in the 14th century an unknown author made useof a Latin translation for his De vita et moribus philosophorum[11] (attributed erroneously to Walter Burley).

Printed editions

Title page of an edition in Greek and Latin, 1594

The first printed editions were Latin translations. The first was byAmbrogio Traversari, and made before 1432.[11] The Greek text of thelives of Aristotle and Theophrastus appeared in the third volume of theAldine Aristotle in 1497. The first edition of the whole Greek text wasthat published by Hieronymus Froben in 1533.[12]

The first critical edition of the entire text, by H.S. Long in the OxfordClassical Texts, was not produced until 1964;[8] this edition wassuperseded by Miroslav Marcovich's Teubner edition, publishedbetween 1999 and 2002. A new edition, by Tiziano Dorandi, is to bepublished by Cambridge University Press (see T. Dorandi, LaertianaBerlin, Walter de Gruyter 2009).

English translations

There have been three English translations of the complete Lives. Thefirst was a late 17th-century translation by ten different persons.[13] Abetter translation was made by Charles Duke Yonge (1853),[14] butalthough this was more literal, it still contained many inaccuracies.[15]

The translation by Robert Drew Hicks (1925) for the Loeb ClassicalLibrary,[16] remains the definitive translation, although it is slightlybowdlerized.

Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers 26

Notes[1] Montaigne, Essays II.10 "Of Books" (http:/ / www. uoregon. edu/ ~rbear/ montaigne/ 2x. htm).[2] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", page xix, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library[3] Diogenes Lartius, ii. 93-104[4] Diogenes Lartius, vii. 36[5] Diogenes Lartius, x. 22-26[6] Friedrich Nietzsche, Gesammelte Werke (http:/ / www. archive. org/ details/ gesammeltewerke01nietuoft), page 363[7] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", page xxi, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library[8] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", page xxv, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library[9] Robert Drew Hicks. " Introduction (http:/ / www. tertullian. org/ rpearse/ manuscripts/ diogenes_laertius. htm)", in the 1925 edition of the

Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library. The statement by Robert Hicks that "the scribe obviously knew no Greek" is roundlyrejected by Herbert Long.

[10] Robert Drew Hicks. " Introduction (http:/ / www. tertullian. org/ rpearse/ manuscripts/ diogenes_laertius. htm)", in the 1925 edition of theLives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library

[11] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", page xxvi, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library[12] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", page xxiv, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library[13] The Lives, Opinions, and Remarkable Sayings of the most famous Ancient Philosophers, Volume 1 (published 1688), Volume 2 (published

1696).[14] The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, trans. C. D. Yonge. (1853). Bohn[15] Herbert S. Long, "Introduction", page xiii, in the 1972 reprint of the Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Loeb Classical Library[16] Lives of Eminent Philosophers, trans. Robert Drew Hicks. (1925). Loeb Classical Library

External links Diogenes Lartius, Lives of the Eminent Philosophers, translated by Robert Drew Hicks (1925), Loeb Classical

Library. Diogenes Lartius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (http:/ / classicpersuasion. org/ pw/ diogenes/ ),

translated by Charles Duke Yonge (1853) Ancient Greek text of Diogenes' Lives (http:/ / www. mikrosapoplous. gr/ dl/ dl. html) Article on the Manuscript versions (http:/ / www. tertullian. org/ rpearse/ manuscripts/ diogenes_laertius. htm) at

the Tertullian Project A bibliography on the Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (http:/ / www. ontology. co/ biblio/

diogenes-laertius-biblio. htm)

27

The Milesians

Milesian school

Location of Miletus on the western coast ofAnatolia, home to Thales, Anaximander, and

Anaximenes

The Milesian school was a school of thought founded in the 6thCentury BC. The ideas associated with it are exemplified by threephilosophers from the Ionian town of Miletus, on the Aegean coast ofAnatolia: Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes. They introducednew opinions contrary to the prevailing viewpoint on how the worldwas organized, in which natural phenomena were explained solely bythe will of anthropomorphized gods. The Milesians presented a view ofnature in terms of methodologically observable entities, and as suchwas one of the first truly scientific philosophies.

Note: It is important to make a distinction between the Milesian schooland the Ionian, which includes the philosophies of both the Milesiansand other distinctly different Ionian thinkers such as Heraclitus. Seealso Pre-Socratic philosophy.

Philosophy of natureThese philosophers defined all things by their quintessential substance (which Aristotle, perhaps beinganachronistic,[1] called the / arche)[2] of which the world was formed and which was the source of everything.Thales thought it to be water.[3] But as it was impossible to explain some things (such as fire) as being composed ofthis element, Anaximander chose an unobserved, undefined element, which he called apeiron[4] (=having nolimit). He reasoned that if each of the four traditional elements (water, air, fire, and earth) are opposed to the otherthree, and if they cancel each other out on contact, none of them could constitute a stable, truly elementary form ofmatter. Consequently, there must be another entity from which the others originate, and which must truly be the mostbasic element of all.The notion of temporal infinity was familiar to the Greek mind in the religious conception ofimmortality and Anaximander's description was in terms appropriate to this conception.This arche is called "eternaland ageless"(Hippolitus I,6,I;DK B2). The unspecified nature of the apeiron upset critics, which caused Anaximenesto define it as being air, a more concrete, yet still subtle, element.[5] Anaximenes held that by its evaporation andcondensation, air can change into other elements or substances such as fire, wind, clouds, water, and earth. However,our modern concept of energy is much more similar to Anaximander's apeiron.

CosmologyThe differences between the three philosophers was not limited to the nature of matter. Each of them conceived ofthe universe differently. Thales held that the Earth was floating in water. Anaximander placed the Earth at the centerof a universe composed of hollow, concentric wheels filled with fire, and pierced by holes at various intervals, whichappeared as the sun, the moon, and the other stars. For Anaximenes, the sun and the moon were flat disks travelingaround a heavenly canopy, on which the stars were fixed.

Milesian school 28

Bibliography Lahaye, Robert. La philosophie ionienne. L'cole de Milet, Cdre, Paris, 1966.

References[1] Kirk, Raven and Schofield, The Presocratic Philosophers (Cambridge University Press, 1983, 108-109.[2] Aristotle, Metaphysics Alpha, 983b6ff.[3] Kirk, Raven and Schofield, 89.[4] Kirk, Raven and Schofield, 105-108.[5] Kirk, Raven and Schofield, 143.

Thales 29

Thales

Thales of Miletus ( )

ThalesFull name Thales of Miletus ( )

Born ca. 624625 BC

Died ca. 547546 BC

School Ionian, Milesian school, Naturalism

Main interests Ethics, Metaphysics, Mathematics, Astronomy

Notable ideas Water is the physis, Thales' theorem

Thales of Miletus (pronounced /eliz/; Greek: , Thals; c. 624 BC c. 546 BC) was a pre-Socratic Greekphilosopher from Miletus in Asia Minor, and one of the Seven Sages of Greece. Many, most notably Aristotle,regard him as the first philosopher in the Greek tradition.[1] According to Bertrand Russell, "Western philosophybegins with Thales."[2] Thales attempted to explain natural phenomena without reference to mythology and wastremendously influential in this respect. Almost all of the other pre-Socratic philosophers follow him in attempting toprovide an explanation of ultimate substance, change, and the existence of the worldwithout reference tomythology. Those philosophers were also influential, and eventually Thales' rejection of mythological explanationsbecame an essential idea for the scientific revolution. He was also the first to define general principles and set forthhypotheses, and as a result has been dubbed the "Father of Science", though it is argued that Democritus is actuallymore deserving of this title.[3] [4]

In mathematics, Thales used geometry to solve problems such as calculating the height of pyramids and the distanceof ships from the shore. He is credited with the first use of deductive reasoning applied to geometry, by deriving fourcorollaries to Thales' Theorem. As a result, he has been hailed as the first true mathematician and is the first knownindividual to whom a mathematical discovery has been attributed.[5]

Thales 30

Life

Marble statue of Thales

Thales lived around the mid 620s mid 540s BC and was born in the cityof Miletus. Miletus was an ancient Greek Ionian city on the western coastof Asia Minor (in what is today the Aydin Province of Turkey), near themouth of the Maeander River.

Background

The dates of Thales' life are not known precisely. The time of his life isroughly established by a few dateable events mentioned in the sources andan estimate of his length of life. According to Herodotus, Thales oncepredicted a solar eclipse which has been determined by modern methods tohave been on May 28, 585 BC.[6] Diogenes Lartius quotes the chronicle ofApollodorus as saying that Thales died at 78 in the 58th Olympiad(548545), and Sosicrates as reporting that he was 90 at his death.

As mentioned, according to tradition, Thales was born in Miletus, AsiaMinor. Diogenes Laertius states that ("according to Herodotus and Dourisand Democritus") his parents were Examyes and Cleobuline, Phoenician nobles. Giving another opinion, heultimately connects Thales' family line back to Phoenician prince Cadmus. Diogenes also reports two other stories,one that he married and had a son, Cybisthus or Cybisthon, or adopted his nephew of the same name. The second isthat he never married, telling his mother as a young man that it was too early to marry, and as an older man that itwas too late. A much earlier source - Plutarch - tells the following story: Solon who visited Thales asked him thereason which kept him single. Thales answered that he did not like the idea of having to worry about children.Nevertheless, several years later Thales, anxious for family, adopted his nephew Cybisthus.

Thales involved himself in many activities, taking the role of an innovator. Some say that he left no writings, othersthat he wrote "On the Solstice" and "On the Equinox". Neither has survived. Diogenes Lartius quotes letters ofThales to Pherecydes and Solon, offering to review the book of the former on religion, and offering to keep companywith the latter on his sojourn from Athens. Thales identifies the Milesians as Athenians.[7]

Business

An olive mill and an olive press dating fromRoman times in Capernaum, Israel.

Several anecdotes suggest that Thales was not solely a thinker; he wasinvolved in business and politics. One story recounts that he bought allthe olive presses in Miletus after predicting the weather and a goodharvest for a particular year. Another version of this same story statesthat he bought options for the use of the presses not to becomewealthy, but merely to demonstrate to his fellow Milesians that hecould use his intelligence to enrich himself.[8] This can be consideredthe first known example of options trading.

Politics

Thales political life had mainly to do with the involvement of theIonians in the defense of Anatolia against the growing power of the Persians, who were then new to the region. Aking had come to power in neighboring Lydia, Croesus, who was somewhat too aggressive for the size of his army.He had conquered most of the states of coastal Anatolia, including the cities of the Ionians. The story is told inHerodotus.[9]

Thales 31

The Lydians were at war with the Medes, a remnant of the first wave of Persians in the region, over the issue ofrefuge the Lydians had given to some Scythian soldiers of fortune inimical to the Medes. The war endured for fiveyears, but in the sixth an eclipse of the Sun (mentioned above) spontaneously halted a battle in progress (the Battle ofHalys).

Total eclipse of the Sun

It seems that Thales had predicted this solar eclipse. The Seven Sageswere most likely already in existence, as Croesus was also heavilyinfluenced by Solon of Athens, another sage. Whether Thales waspresent at the battle is not known, nor are the exact terms of theprediction, but based on it the Lydians and Medes made peaceimmediately, swearing a blood oath.

The Medes were dependencies of the Persians under Cyrus. Croesusnow sided with the Medes against the Persians and marched in thedirection of Iran (with far fewer men than he needed). He was stoppedby the river Halys, then unbridged. This time he had Thales with him,perhaps by invitation. Whatever his status, the king gave the problemto him, and he got the army across by digging a diversion upstream soas to reduce the flow, making it possible to ford the river. The channels

ran around both sides of the camp.

The two armies engaged at Pteria in Cappadocia. As the battle was indecisive but paralyzing to both sides, Croesusmarched home, dismissed his mercenaries and sent emissaries to his dependents and allies to ask them to dispatchfresh troops to Sardis. The issue became more pressing when the Persian army showed up at Sardis. DiogenesLaertius[10] tells us that Thales gained fame as a counsellor when he advised the Milesians not to engage in asymmachia, a fighting together, with the Lydians. This has sometimes been interpreted as an alliance, but a rulerdoes not ally with his subjects.Croesus was defeated before the city of Sardis by Cyrus, who subsequently spared Miletus because it had taken noaction. Cyrus was so impressed by Croesus wisdom and his connection with the sages that he spared him and tookhis advice on various matters.The Ionians were now free. Herodotus says that Thales advised them to form an Ionian state; that is, a bouleuterion(deliberative body) to be located at Teos in the center of Ionia. The Ionian cities should be demoi, or districts.Miletus, however, received favorable terms from Cyrus. The others remained in an Ionian League of 12 cities(excluding Miletus now), and were subjugated by the Persi